Daily Reflections: 1 Corinthians 3:10-22

This is a free resource created and published by the team at Glasgow City Mission. We hope you find it useful. If you would like to support our ongoing work with those affected by homelessness, addiction and poverty, please consider donating by following the link below.

Building on Christ: The Foundation of True Wisdom

1 Corinthians 3:10-22

¹⁰By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should build with care. ¹¹For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. ¹²If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, ¹³their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. ¹⁴If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. ¹⁵If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames.

¹⁶Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in your midst? ¹⁷If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person; for God’s temple is sacred, and you together are that temple.

¹⁸Do not deceive yourselves. If any of you think you are wise by the standards of this age, you should become “fools” so that you may become wise. ¹⁹For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. As it is written: “He catches the wise in their craftiness”^[a]; ²⁰and again, “The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile.”^[b] ²¹So then, no more boasting about human leaders! All things are yours, ²²whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas^[c] or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours,

Background: Paul continues to challenge the believers in Corinth due to their worldly wisdom and divisive arguments over their preferred leaders.

Monday 5^th February

Paul continues to challenge the Corinthian believers. This letter, and much of Scripture, can be used as a mirror for us to see ourselves and detect where we might be warping things to our own sense of truth and worldly wisdom. To many of us, Paul might sound arrogant here. He calls himself a “wise builder” and some have translated this as “master builder”. But if we look into this further, we will realise that Paul is not as arrogant as it may first appear.

Paul is the one who has laid the foundations of the believer’s faith. As a “wise” master builder, Paul simply builds with what he has been given: Christ himself. Christ, more specifically Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection, is the foundation of the church. This is the message that Paul proclaimed, the only starting point for Christian life in God. When we understand this, and when we experience along with Christ our own sense of weakness and foolishness, we will see Paul not as an arrogant master builder but as a genuine leader who pours out a sacred offering. Paul has received Christ and that is all he wants to give.

Many of us are in positions of leading and serving in the mission or our local church. How could you take the posture of Paul – the sacrificial master builder? Are you sometimes tempted to be a powerful and influential builder for your own sake? Or do you sometimes shy away from building anything at all? Take this to the Lord in prayer. Let’s keep it simple today – We have received Christ and Christ we will give.

Tuesday 6^th February

¹²If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, ¹³their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. ¹⁴If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. ¹⁵If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames.

We reflected yesterday on Paul describing himself as a wise master builder who has laid the foundations of the Christian faith amongst the Corinthian believers. This foundation is Christ – his death and resurrection. Paul received Christ and that is what he gives. Other teachers and leaders are now having an influence on these believers and the believers in turn are picking their favourite speakers. Paul describes this process with a picture. Some of the teaching and wisdom being shared with the believers is described as solid, valuable gold. Other teachers are bringing worldly wisdom, vague truth, old and unhelpful traditions, or pleasant self-seeking additions to the faith. These things are described as wood, hay or straw that will be burned up when tested.

This passage brings into contrast Godly wisdom and worldly wisdom. Godly wisdom is rooted in Christ, in the cross, in weakness and suffering. Godly wisdom is found in the resurrection also – an unlikely strength, hope when there seems no way, and a power that comes from God alone. Worldly wisdom is both subtly and obviously opposed to this. Can you discern any worldly wisdom that you have been allowing to be laid on the foundation of your faith recently? Take some time in prayer to allow the wisdom of Christ, his cross and resurrection, to be laid on you now.

Wednesday 7^th February

Christ is the foundation of faith and of the church. All those who put their faith in Christ alone, in his death and resurrection, are built into a new, living, holy temple. This is not an individual sport or solo lifestyle choice. We are his temple together. We are his – together. I feel a real sense that as a ministry we need reminded of Christ and Christ alone as our foundation. He is calling us to rely on him together. “Remain in me and I will remain in you”. This is a corporate call and we do it together. So, together let us choose Christ alone, for no other frame will do. As we choose Christ, he can’t help but dwell in us by his Spirit. As his Spirit flows in us and amongst us we then can’t help but love one another, prefer one another, and then seek to share this with those who don’t yet know him as their solid foundation. This all starts with a genuine connection with the person of Jesus Christ. And then an ongoing choice, together, to continue to choose him alone.

Thursday 8^th February

What is the wisdom of the world and what is God’s wisdom? Could it be that in our churches and ministries right now we have worldly wisdom masquerading as the wisdom of Christ? This takes prayerful discernment to notice. As soon as you see people pushing for position or power, an over-talk of success, or a myriad of other self-seeking behaviours you will start to smell that the wisdom of the world is creeping into your church or ministry. This is what was happening through some of the teachers and leaders in the Corinthian church. They were putting self and their own preferences first.

“Godly wisdom” is found in the lives and ministries of those who embody Christ’s cross-shaped love. That’s the message of 1 Corinthians 1-4. This folly, the foolishness of self-giving love, is wisdom. This is not an easy wisdom to display! It takes Christ in me and you to enable this to happen.

Friday 9^th February

²¹So then, no more boasting about human leaders! All things are yours, ²²whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas^[^c^] or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, ²³and you are of Christ, and Christ is of God.

Where do we find our identity? It is very easy for us as Christians to give the Sunday school answer before engaging a bit deeper with that question. For the early believers in Corinth, they were falling into the trap of placing their identity in a particular leader that aligned most with their preferences or world view. Paul was most likely to appeal to Gentile converts, his teaching was clear that they had been set free from the rules and regulations of Judaism. Apollos the scholar, orator and teacher from the great university city of Alexandria with his deep knowledge of the Old Testament attracted intellectuals. Cephas (Peter) had a uniquely close relationship with Jesus during his earthly ministry and this gave him a special status. He was also steeped in Judaism and cautious about abandoning the old customs. You can see already how people in the Corinthian church would lean towards those they agreed with and those who were like them. We are no different today and fall into the same traps. There were even those in the early church who boasted that they “followed Christ” (1 Cor 1:12) but this was said with a heavy hint of spiritual superiority. “I don’t need a leader like Paul or Apollos, I just have a hot line to Christ.” Now this might sound good on the surface but if it has an edge of arrogance it can lead to self-serving actions. So, what then do we do?

Well to paraphrase Paul, “Pipe down about all your preferences and opinions and your spiritual superiority. What really matters is that you are in Christ, and Christ is in God. Stay connected to him in humility, in weakness and with a self-giving love for his church and this broken world. Get over yourself and get in-to Christ.”

Saturday 10^th February

Philippians 2:1-4

Therefore, if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, ²then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. ³Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, ⁴not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

Sunday 11^th February

Philippians 2:5-8

⁵In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

⁶Who, being in very nature^[^a^] God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
⁷rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature^[^b^] of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
⁸And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!